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Six must-have iPhone freebies

How do I love thee, iPhone (and iPod Touch)? Let me count the ways. Hmmm. Well, space doesn't permit me to list all 12,503, so I'll settle for six. As in, six free apps you absolutely positively gotta get. (Note: as with my previous batch of iPhone freebies, all links go straight to iTunes.)

Mancala FS5 I love the Mancala board game, and this iPhone edition is even better. It teaches beginners the basics, automatically moves your beads, and supports Internet multiplayer! (You can even play against your AIM buddies.) Consider splurging on the $1.99 full version to enjoy ad-free play. NPR Mobile Though not an official NPR app, it lets you browse broadcasts by topic, series, and even commentator, then stream to your heart's content. It can also do a location search, great for when you're traveling and want to tune the car radio to the nearest NPR station. Slacker Radio Best. Streaming music app. Ever. I know some folks prefer Pandora, but I've always loved the Web-based Slacker and its robust custom-station building. The new iPhone app (pictured) is just plain fantastic. Read my full review here. Sportacular At the risk of ruining my geek cred, I do follow (and even play) some sports. Sportacular gives you scores, standings, schedules, stats, and more. It also lets you designate favorite teams so you can track them more easily.… Read more

Candy Coating leads to App Store acceptance

The iTunes App Store has been full of twists and turns, but now things are a little bit sweeter for at least one application developer. Catamount Software's remake of the cult classic game DopeWars, called Prohibition 2: The Dope Wars, was rejected by Apple for inclusion into the App Store until the developer gave the application a major face-lift. According to a post on the company's Web site:

"Apple's rejection of DopeWars was frustrating because we thought we had a big hit on our hands. We decided to rename it, gave the police and player pixie … Read more

iPhone apps of the week

When I was at Macworld a couple of weeks ago, it shouldn't come as a surprise that I had my eyes peeled for upcoming iPhone apps. Certainly the new 17-inch MacBook and the updates to iWork and iLife were at the top of my priority list, but once I started walking around the show floor, my mind quickly turned to iPhone apps.

There were several on display, but one game at the Freeverse booth from developer Strange Flavour caught my eye immediately. I didn't say anything about it in previous posts because I wanted to wait until it … Read more

Itunes App Store: 15,000 apps, 500 million served

Apple's Web site now displays a banner that proclaims that the iTunes App Store has more than 15,000 apps and 500 million downloads. This is after only six months of the App Store's operation, so it's a significant milestone for Apple.

Before Christmas last year, Apple announced that the App Store had only 10,000 apps and 300 million downloads.

The new numbers show an amazing increase in downloads from the App Store when compared with the old milestone.

Apple did not break these numbers down by free versus paid apps, but regardless, this is a … Read more

Updated App Store Rules include: iFarting in, iBoobs Out and more

The Apple iTunes App Store boasts over 10,000 applications and approximately 300 million downloads just six months after its launch, although App Store rules have been relaxed, the ecosystem is still more restrained than some would like.

We've written about many of the barred apps (here and here ). At issue has been Apple's often inconsistent interpretation of the iPhone app approval rules. Acting in it's own interest and those of it's partner AT&T, Apple has blocked tethering and VoIP apps from the iTunes App Store, and taken other measures to protect the bandwidth … Read more

Apple approves e-book after dirty words removed

An e-book submitted to Apple's App Store has been approved after the author removed language that apparently offended Apple.

CNET's David Carnoy wrote a book called Knife Music last year, and attempted to submit it to the App Store as an e-book. Apple rejected his application for containing "objectionable content," which appeared to be a couple of uses of that four-letter word that starts with F.

But Carnoy decided to remove that type of language from the book, which he said didn't amount to all that many words in the first place. Upon resubmitting the … Read more

Google gives Apps admins more password control

Google on Thursday offered administrators of its Premier version of Google Apps more control over the passwords their users choose to access data in Gmail, Docs, and other hosted applications.

Google Apps administrators can now set a minimum password length and will be able to see how strong each user's password remains over time. They can then suggest that users change them if the passwords become weakened. Password strength degrades as the words and names on which they are based become more common and more subject to dictionary attacks.

"Customers were asking for (this) and looking for better … Read more

Field goal for the win

Paper Football is a fun, free app that simulates the classic, two-player, football-like game that's usually played on classroom desks or school cafeteria tables, with fingers for goalposts and a folded-up piece of notebook paper for a ball.

Much as in real Paper Football (or Flick or Finger Football), you take turns flicking the ball across the table, trying to score a touchdown by going over the edge without falling off. Once you score, you go for an extra point by trying to flick the ball through a "goalpost" formed by the opposing player's fingers. Paper … Read more

New browsing apps available for the iPhone

We're guessing that they won't surpass iBeer in popularity any time soon, but this is big news for the App Store: Apple has quietly started allowing Web browser applications in.

According to MacRumors, a small bunch of browser apps were recently let into the App Store. They include the free Edge Browser, the historyless Incognito ($1.99), the tabbed WebMate ($0.99), and something called Shaking Web ($1.99) that attempts to make Web sites easier to read.

Previously, Apple had not approved third-party browsers for the App Store; its own Safari browser is preinstalled on the iPhone. … Read more